INFLUENCE OF GANDHI.

Waikato Times, Volume 97, Issue 1600, 31 May 1924, Page 13 (Supplement)

INFLUENCE OF GANDHI.

SPIRITUAL FORCE IN INDIA. (By "Scissfbus."} Serious and informed English opinion need? to take into account the one oafent fact that just as in Egypt it is Zaprhlul who now counts and no one else, so in India it is Mahatma. Gandhi who counts and the rest are nowhere," writes 0. F. Andrews in the Manchester Guardian. "Zaghrul came from the peasant class. Mahatma. Gandhi became., by an act, of religious poverty, a peasant. It is this direct touch with the common folk which has mad 3 th ise national movements in Egypt and India so strong and active. "There is no other force in India remotely to compare with that of Mahatma Gandhi. His least word sways the hearts of Mohammedans as well as Hindus. The President of the All-India Christian Conference called him the crcatcst living 'lndian Christian,' because of his devoted life of love and service. The Parsee priests in their fire temples offer prayers for his Jong life. He is revered as no Indian in modern times has ever been revered. A Great Opportunity. "Therefore the whole political situation has been lightened by the wise and humane act of his release. There has been an immediate response of the most remarkable kind. From Mahatma Gandhi himself has come a renewed offer of friendship. His words hove been echoed by MauTana Muhammad Ah, the leader of islam in India, and also by Pundit Motilal Nehru, the head of the Swaraj party in the Legislative Assembly. Nationalist papers have vied with one another in praising the Government of India for its kindly deed. There lias not been a single discordant note. The opportunity is a great one for a man of imagination to lay hold of. and thus to regain som-ethfn.q- of that earlier friendship between India and Great Britain, which was so deep and true and sincere. "The actual news of his release came to him while f was with him one early morning in the hospital. The dO'Ctor, Colonel Maddock, who iiad performed the operation was the first to bring the good tidings. Mahatma Gandhi remained quite calm and collected. 'This is no release to me,' he said, 'but only greater responsibility than ever.' He then said laughingly to the doctor, 'I trust that you will allow me to remain your patient a littb longer.' The doctor smiled in turn snd sad that he would have to obey orders while he was under his charge.

"A remarkable friendship has grown up between these two men, and Ihe praise given by Mahatma Gandhi for the treatment he has received has jven unbounded. The extraordinary outburst of friendly feeling towards Englishmen which spread like a great wave over the country after Mahatma Grandhj's release has been in no slight measure due lo the knowledge, which reached to the remotest villages, thai Mahatma Gandhi's life had been saved owinp; to the skill and devotion of Colonel Maddock, the English doctor.

"Surely here was Western science at its best, and Mahatma Gandhi, who has all ihe fervour of an iconoclast against modern civilisation, was deeply impressed. He thanked the doctor and nurses in no measured terms for their tenderness and care. He is fully aware that he owes his life to their skill, and he has gratefully informed the Indian public of the fact. He lias used the occasion also for impressing once more the vital point that his opposition is against the bureaucratic system in India, not against Englishmen themselves, whom he counts among his friends.' The Government of India.

"'lndeed.,' he says in his letter, 'we want to regard Englishmen as our friends, and not to misunderstand them by treating them as our enemies. And if we arc to-day engaged in a struggle against the British Government, it is against the system for which it stands in India, and not against Englishmen who are administering the svstem. I know that many of us have failed to understand and always bear in mind this distinction, and in so far as we have failed we have harmed our cause.'

"This is a. true utterance, generously uttered, a.nd. as I have twice repeated, it has created at once an atmosphere of friendliness in India such as I personally have nol, known for some years. What the words of the Duke of Connaught, so nobly and humbly spoken, when hearts were stii sore, could not accomplish, has, I verily believe, been accomplished today.

"The Punjab wrongs at Amritsar have at last been forgotten in tho outburst of joy over Mahatma Gandhi's deliverance not only from prison but from death. The Mussulmans are not mentioning to-day the Khalil'ate. They .are rejoicing ;ilong with Hindus in Mahatma Gandhi's return from the Valley of the Shadow of Death. No other suhjoct is on people's lips, and the papers each day in the vernaculars are eagerly scanned for any fraction of news concerning their leader and friend. The Saint Politician.

"The question may well be asked by those who have followed this narrative whether this is ail the news of the political situation in India to-day; Whether the Council sessions.in Delhi and the. Provincial Councils at the different capitals, which are passing iheir Swaraj resolutions, mean nothing at ail. My answer would be that they cannot be compared with the political importance of this one frail, pathetic figure, racked and tormented with pain and suffering yet bearing each day's burden' with a cheerful smile, in the hospital at Poona. For India 'is vitally, essentially, immea-surably-religious; and the influence of one saint who has won the love and devotion of Ihe poor is greater than that ol' ail the rest of the politicians put together. This saint politician, if I may use the strange hybrid word, has already Liken, into his own hands (he reins of political leadership again, lie is ruh'rm- India, as no Viceroy can do. from the iiospilal itself."